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HP Chromebook X2 – Real World Review

About five or six years ago, I started using Chromebooks. Up to that point, I was squarely in the world of Windows.

I loved Windows as an operating system, but grew weary of the slow boots, slow updates, and program conflicts. I was also looking for something cheaper than most of the Windows laptops on the market.

Chromebook fit the bill. My first Chromebook was about $200 and served me very well. It booted within 20 seconds, the updates were not intrusive, and the system just worked. The only reason I ever upgraded to new computers was to get one that was faster and had more ram.

I’ve been using this Chromebook for about a year. It is light, quick, and starts up in seconds. Since it is detachable, I use it as a tablet as well. It comes with both a keyboard and a pen.

Continue reading “HP Chromebook X2 – Real World Review”

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Four Tools To take a ChromeBook Beyond the Browser

NOTE: I changed the title from “Four Tools to take ChromeOS Beyond the Browser” to “Four Tools to take a Chromebook Beyond the Browser” to reflect that Linux is used rather than native ChromeOS. Thanks to Philotech Mueller from the Chromebooks GooglePlus community for pointing it out!

I’ve already written about why I use Chromebooks. Chromebooks enable me to spend time focusing on what matters rather than administrating and troubleshooting. In that post I said that Chromebooks weren’t designed for high-end computing tasks, however, there are some tools that take Chromebooks beyond the browser. You can do more than check email and post on Facebook. While Chromebooks are great for resource lite tasks, you can push them far beyond simple tasks.

Here are my top Four tools for taking ChromeOS beyond the Browser: Continue reading “Four Tools To take a ChromeBook Beyond the Browser”

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Why I use a Chromebook

I’m a big fan of Chromebooks. I purchased my first Chomebook, a Toshiba 1st Generation, a few years back. Even though I am comfortable with technology, I love the simplicity, affordability, and how Chromebooks just work allowing me to focus on what matters; my work.

More times than I can share, Windows would “get in the way” of focusing on what matters. I’d be buzzing along and then an error, update, or some odd behavior, would sidetrack me for hours. Sometimes I only wanted to do something simple, like check information on a webpage, but the operating system would get in the way. I have not had this happen with my Chromebooks. Continue reading “Why I use a Chromebook”

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Transitioning to JoliOS

The Computers / Background

From time to time I become discontented with my computing situation. I’ve moved away from having the latest and greatest PC. Now I would much rather have a cheaper PC and find ways to get it to run well.

My life is surrounded by four different computers. I have a computer at the office, a family computer at home, my main laptop, and an older (perhaps 10 years or so) laptop that is making the rounds in my family.

My computer at the office has always been underpowered. I purchased it used because I wasn’t going to be doing any complex computing on it. While it ran Windows XP well for a while, over time it ran slower and slower and slower. The degradation of Windows based OSes is well known. Wiping the computer and reinstalling is an option, but also a pain, especially if there are a lot of windows programs to reinstall. Continue reading “Transitioning to JoliOS”

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Book Review: Viral – Dr. Leonard Sweet

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Full Disclosure: I received this book as a review copy in exchange for an honest review.

I must start out by confessing that I am a Leonard Sweet fan. I was unaware of how much a fan I was until I read his book Viral. Through 198 pages Sweet leads an expedition into two convergent cultures. That of the written word (Gutenbergers) and that of the technological (Googlers). The goal is to get the Gutenbergers to realize it is a Googler world and if we are going to be faithful to the call of God we must be willing to not only recognize the changes in our culture, but find ways to connect and love in this new world.
Continue reading “Book Review: Viral – Dr. Leonard Sweet”